How does the Chinese Communist Party govern the country?

Chapter 8

As the characteristics and design of the system that all power belongs to the people, people will naturally ask: where does the power of the people's congress come from?In short, it comes from the mandate of the people.Through elections, the people produce representatives representing their own wishes, who form representative bodies and exercise state power on behalf of the people.Therefore, democratic elections are the organizational foundation of the people's congress system and the source of power for people's congresses at all levels.

In accordance with the provisions of the Constitution, the National People's Congress Election Law and the National People's Congress Law, deputies to the People's Congress are widely representative. Except for those who have been deprived of political power, citizens of the People's Republic of China who have reached the age of 18, regardless of ethnicity, race, gender, or occupation , family background, religious belief, education level, property status, and length of residence, all have the right to vote and stand for election.With the development and changes of the times, the procedures and methods of electing deputies to the National People's Congress are also changing. In July 1979, the Second Session of the Fifth National People's Congress passed the "Electoral Law of the People's Republic of China on the National People's Congress and Local People's Congresses at All Levels", which revised the 7 Election Law.Since then, in order to meet the needs of the development of the socialist market economy and the development of democratic politics, the Fifth Session of the Fifth National People's Congress in December 1953, the Eighteenth Session of the Standing Committee of the Sixth National People's Congress in December 1982, and the Eighth National People's Congress in February 12 The twelfth meeting of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the twelfth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Tenth National People's Congress in October 1986, and the third meeting of the Eleventh National People's Congress in March 12 successively made important revisions and improvements to the election law.

这五次修改中一个非常重要的内容是规范代表名额和分配，把原来规定的农村和城市每个代表所代表人口的比例由县级4：1、省级5：1、全国8：1，逐步修改为4：1，直至2010年3月十一届全国人大三次会议修改为1：1，即实行城乡按相同人口比例选举人大代表。这无疑赋予了曾经占人口比例80%，目前占49%的农村居民更公平和更广泛地参与国家管理的权利。

Hu Xiaoyan, who became the first migrant worker representative to the National People's Congress in 2008, expects more migrant workers like herself to become the next National People's Congress representative. In 2009, Hu Xiaoyan settled in Foshan City, Guangdong, and changed from a rural household registration to an urban household registration. "My household registration and rural household registration have changed, but some things have not changed." Hu Xiaoyan said that she still lives among migrant workers, and her family is also migrant workers. She works and communicates with migrant workers, and pays attention to and cares for them , to express their demands on their behalf.When she was first elected to the National People's Congress, she answered reporters' questions very simply, and she did not dare to say hello to the experts and officials in the Guangzhou regiment who accompanied her.

Through experience, she matured.She discloses her phone number and mailbox on her blog, announcing the progress of various tasks. In addition to dealing with a large number of blog messages and emails, she also often answers various calls. In June 2010, Hu Xiaoyan and the Southern Workers' Daily jointly opened the "Haiyan Mailbox" to reflect the voices of migrant workers. In August 6, she advocated the opening of "Xiaoyan Summer Paradise" specially for migrant children... At the "two sessions", she suggested that the education of migrant workers' children should be included in the education development plan and education budget; Participate in endowment insurance by category. "I think whoever speaks for migrant workers, who represents the interests of migrant workers, is the real representative of migrant workers." Hu Xiaoyan said.

Like Hu Xiaoyan, deputies to the people's congresses at all levels in China come from various sources, not full-time but part-time. They always work and live among the masses, and have a natural and close relationship with the masses. The voice is empathetic and the deepest experience.It is through these representatives from all walks of life that the people's congress system brings together the implementation of the Constitution, laws, and policies, as well as various opinions and suggestions from the masses, to the people's congress to make decisions on major issues.In order to fully protect the rights of deputies to people's congresses, the Constitution and relevant laws clearly stipulate that deputies to people's congresses shall not be held accountable for their speeches and votes at various meetings of the people's congresses, and deputies to people's congresses at or above the county level shall Without the permission of the presidium of the people's congress at the corresponding level during the session of the congress, and without the permission of the standing committee of the people's congress at the same level when the people's congress at the same level is not in session, no person shall be arrested or tried in a criminal manner.This enables deputies to people's congresses at all levels to fully express public opinion and exercise the power conferred by the people under the protection of the Constitution and laws.

Mao Fengmei is the Secretary of the Party Branch of Dalishu Village, Fengshan Economic Management Zone, Fengcheng City, Liaoning Province, and a representative of the National People's Congress elected for four consecutive terms from the eighth to the No.11.During this period, he put forward more than 200 proposals and proposals, and many of them were adopted. The "Proposal to Exempt Agricultural Tax" was put forward by Mao Fengmei at the First Session of the Ninth National People's Congress in 1998.Some representatives disagreed - the collection of agricultural taxes has been like this for thousands of years, how could it be possible to just cancel it?For the next two years, Mao Fengmei would repeat this suggestion every year.

In December 2005, the No.12 meeting of the Standing Committee of the Tenth National People's Congress passed a decision to abolish the "Agricultural Tax Regulations" from January 19, 2006. At the 1 National People's Congress, Mao Fengmei brought an ear of corn to the venue. "Such a large ear of corn can only be sold for 1 cents... The price of grain must increase by 2009 times." The "small steps and rapid rise" of grain prices was also written into the central document in the year when Mao Fengmei proposed the proposal. It has increased by 3 yuan. In 30, when the delegation of the Third Session of the Eleventh National People's Congress reviewed the government work report, Mao Fengmei proposed that the state should support the loans to grassroots farmers to help farmers solve their financial problems and develop production.For this reason, Mao Fengmei was called "the representative who dared to speak for the peasants". "Through personal experience and research, I know that farmers are really not easy. I can't keep shouting, I have to speak up." Mao Fengmei said, "I don't care what others do, but if I don't do it, Can you be worthy of the common people?"

Hu Xiaoyan and Mao Fengmei are the epitome of the NPC deputies.Each NPC deputies offer advice and suggestions in their own industry and play their due representative role.Take the deputies to the Eleventh National People's Congress as an example:
Su Mingfang from Jiangping Town, Dongxing City, Guangxi Province is the only representative of the Jing nationality in the 2010th National People's Congress.Every time he puts forward proposals during the National People's Congress, there is content to strengthen the protection of Jing nationality culture. In [-], in order to implement the representative's suggestion, the Ministry of Culture issued a special fund to protect the culture of the Jing people.

Xu Zhenchao, deputy to the National People's Congress and captain of the bridge crane team at Qianwan Container Terminal in Qingdao Port, suggested gradually canceling the dual-track pension system for retired employees of state-owned enterprises and institutions during the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" period.

Liu Chuanzhi, deputy to the National People's Congress and chairman of Lenovo Group's board of directors, said when the Beijing delegation reviewed the government work report at the Fourth Session of the Eleventh National People's Congress: "The growth of national fiscal revenue is greater than the growth of GDP, and the growth of GDP is greater than the income of ordinary people in urban and rural areas. How can ordinary people get rich? I have a suggestion, can the government lower the tax on enterprises appropriately, and then use the system as a guarantee to let enterprises transfer this part of their benefits to employees?"

According to statistics, during the Fourth Session of the Eleventh National People's Congress in 2011, delegates made a total of 8043 proposals.After the meeting, the General Office of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress held a handover meeting, agreeing to hand it over to 177 undertaking units for study and handling.Through the joint efforts of all units, all the suggestions put forward by the representatives have been processed and answered.Judging from the handling situation, 77.2% of the total number of suggestions were resolved or planned to be gradually resolved. Most of the representatives were satisfied or basically satisfied with the handling of the proposals and suggestions.Regarding the 2012 suggestions, criticisms and opinions put forward by NPC deputies during the Fifth Session of the Eleventh NPC in 8189, the NPC handed them over to 171 agencies and organizations for research and processing, and determined 13 items as the focus of this year's NPC Handling suggestions.The representative’s suggestions have the following characteristics: first, the number has increased by a certain extent compared with 2011, an increase of 146; second, there are some new changes in the issues that the representative’s suggestions focus on, focusing on economic development, improvement of people’s livelihood, cultural construction and other fields; The third is that the suggestions are more comprehensive, and the number of unresolved suggestions and suggestions put forward in the name of the delegation has increased, making it more difficult to process and respond to the suggestions.

The exercise of power by the people is closely related to legal protection.As the country's highest legislative body, the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee insist on putting people first and making legislation for the people, and actively promote scientific and democratic legislation.Important legislative bills are released to the public in full, widely soliciting and absorbing opinions from all walks of life, and "open-door legislation" has become normalized. On September 2005, 9, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress held the first legislative hearing since the establishment of the National People's Congress in Beijing to solicit opinions on the personal income tax threshold.Representatives from different social classes, including workers and migrant workers, presented their views frankly to the top legislature at the hearing.This hearing is seen as a major innovation of the highest legislature's insistence on "opening the door to legislation" and asking people for advice in the legislative work. After the 27 Labor Contract Law (Draft) was released to the whole society for comments, 2006 pieces of opinions were received, setting a new record in the legislative history of the National People's Congress. After the "Food Safety Law (Draft)" was released in 191849, people put forward 2008 opinions through different means such as the Internet, newspapers, and letters; after the "Property Law (Draft)" was released to the public in full, all sectors of society put forward 11327 opinions.

In order to meet the needs of the country in building a well-off society in an all-round way, according to the central government's strategic task of accelerating social construction focusing on improving people's livelihood, and further strengthening the legislation in the social field, the Legislative Affairs Committee of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress was approved by the Central Organizational Establishment Committee in 2010 The social law office was established to make social law a legal department in the socialist legal system.

In March 2011, the Fourth Session of the Eleventh National People's Congress held the second plenary session. Chairman Wu Bangguo of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress reported to the meeting that by the end of 3, China had enacted 2010 effective laws and 236 administrative regulations. There are more than 690 pieces of local regulations, and the centralized cleaning of current laws, administrative regulations, and local regulations has been fully completed.He solemnly declared: a law that is based on China's national conditions and reality, adapts to the needs of reform, opening up, and socialist modernization, and embodies the will of the party and the people. , a socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics consisting of laws, administrative regulations, local regulations and other legal norms at multiple levels has been formed, and all aspects of national economic construction, political construction, cultural construction, social construction and ecological civilization construction have been legalized. You can rely on.

In 1997, the Fifteenth National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed that by 2010, the legislative goal of forming a socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics would be completed as scheduled.

Li Kanru, an expert on China issues in the United States, pointed out: "In the past 20 years, the National People's Congress has formulated a formal legal encyclopedia, which has transformed China from a country that did not actually have laws until the death of Mao Zedong into a country that has legal rights in many fields. A country with a relatively comprehensive legal foundation. Some of these efforts reflect the introduction of necessary measures to attract foreign investment, but most of the focus is on providing stronger regulation and predictability for China's policies." This evaluation is realistic.

(End of this chapter)